Navigating a Culture of Sexual Objectification

…is something 52% of the population must do, daily.

In fact, it’s something 100% of the population must do daily, but 48% (probably) don’t internalise it as self-image. Although…I’m sure there are tribes that never see any mainstream media, and people who don’t leave their houses or have a television or have the internet….

I promise I’m trying, Inclusion and Accuracy.

Guesstimate: about 89% of the population see images, and films, and television programmes, and news items, and magazines, and adverts, and people that continue to sexualise cis-femininity. Daily. It’s toxic, it’s both surreptitious and brazen, and it affects YOUR BRAIN. And it will affect the brains of your children if you don’t teach them otherwise. This is why when you see any media which promotes anything Bad, you should punch your child. Hard. It’s called aversion therapy, and it works. (You’re welcome.)

Sociological Images has provided all of humankind, that is, everyone that is not one of the PhD-holding editors of the blog, with a series of posts about sexual objectification in (mainly advertising) images. The author, Caroline Heldman, defines the posts as “a series about how girls and women can navigate a culture that treats them like sex objects.” Nice one Caroline; frankly, it’s about time. 24 years into my life (after being groomed by media for all of those, but studying and deconstructing media for four of them) I actively see myself as a brainbodysoul subject, and it feels good in my brainbodysoul. But the grooming runs deep in all of us (eww) and unfortunately, it seems that all people need a frequent reminder that we humans are complex beings and not just the shoulds and givens that our constructs and institutions insist and demand we are and be. So, in conclusion, stop watching and start reading.

There are plenty more interesting articles on sociology, and images, on Sociological Images. But first, check these out as a 101 to not caving to the continual insistence that the female body is SEXY, and that that fact is important to you (oh, and empowering. Definitely empowering.)

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One thought on “Navigating a Culture of Sexual Objectification”

Stop watching and start reading is good advice. So is stop watching OR reading and start doing. The more skills you have in your brain and body to do the things that fulfil you, the less you will regard either as subject to the whims and projections of others. That’s my theory anyway. Like your blog as ever Liz 🙂